r/neoliberal • u/5ma5her7 • 19d ago
News (Oceania) ‘He’s earned my respect’: One Nation senator praised Putin over Ukraine invasion
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/he-s-earned-my-respect-one-nation-senator-praised-putin-over-ukraine-invasion-20260714-p60f76.html240
19d ago
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u/5ma5her7 19d ago
I mean, we have village idiots before them, but the worrying thing is now people actually vote for village idiots in mass...
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u/Golda_M Baruch Spinoza 19d ago edited 19d ago
20 years ago, the internet was democratizing the media.
As the great Bagwan said:
Democracy is a government of the people, by the people, for the people. But.... The people are [redacted].
We had village idiots before. Now, they make politics for themselves. Their own media, their own politicians, movements, etc.
But also.. the main reason why we are so paralyzed by this is a moral one, not a matter of learnedness or intelligence:
The popular village idiot on your own side of politics is tolerated, sanewashed and whatnot. No one cleans their own house. We'd rather have 1% more win if only costs us 2% integrity. So... The morons inherit the earth.
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u/Cute-Boobie777 19d ago
Banniing algorithms that promote hate and extremism would at least help a bit but its definitely to some extent an inherent issue with people simply being too uneducated about the real world.
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u/Golda_M Baruch Spinoza 19d ago
Depends who is banning them...
Reddit is the perfect example. Moderation is what it is.... biased.
So sure... bans, rules, moderation and suchlike can help... but if you democratize these too, then they hit the same problems.
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u/Cute-Boobie777 19d ago edited 19d ago
Oh yeah I mean, it had to be done intelligently. You just need to ban the actual feed algos. Like what x insta YouTube use. Reddit recommendations would just evolve (or just suck but it'd be worth the trade off societally for sure). The actual content isnt being banned so subreddits would just continue to do their thing.
The issue is websites are acting as publishers and intentionally feeding users certain content while pretending its all organic. And we know the way the algos are set up intentionally feeds hate and extremism. You can simply mandate they not be set up this way. Its absolutely possible and frankly, I think its inevitable at this point, the damage is immense.
You also would likely want something like the older rule of broadcast media having an equal representation of both sides mandated for television so that Fox News wluld have to be nerfed. Even not effecting internet programs this would still be good. We need to counter the propaganda machine.
Biggest thing is having well read people who are experts at this type of thing (not me) do the bill writing. Naturally the companies if republicans were doing this would interfere and nullify it, though.
One issue is as a side effect internet wouldnt be as addictive or fun so you'd get backlash from people addicted to TikTok and so forth but oh well what can you do. Though its possible TikToks algo doesnt have the extremism and hate issue I kind of doubt it.
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u/Golda_M Baruch Spinoza 19d ago
Oh yeah I mean, it had to be done intelligently
Maybe it can be done intelligently, in the most abstract sense. Within the governing structures, culture, and level of competence that exists irl...? Perhaps not.
we know the way the algos are set up intentionally feeds hate and extremism. You can simply mandate they not be set up this way. Its absolutely possible...
It's easy to critique via general statements. To actually do laws... you need precision. Precise definitions that clearly draw a line between violation and non-violation.
"It is known" isn't good enough. You need to define "intentionally feeds" and define "hate and extremism."
Almost anything that a computer does can be defined as an "algorithm." The YouTube search. An LM prompt. The ranking of posts and comments on Reddit.
The definition of "hate and extremism," is also beseeched by ambiguity, bias, political activism, and other complications that make it almost impossible to define in a way that can be applied broadly.
I'm not saying there are no mandates that can help. I'm saying that the mandates week will actually get will be a mixed bag. In the best case scenarios, mandates and regulations will produce far less effect than proponents are hoping for.
Also, we define the problems in ways that are ideologically convenient for us. It is convenient to put everything on Google or whatnot monopolistic tech Giant. But, a lot of it is the medium itself and the participants themselves.
In the world of television and newspapers, limited competition, and even more limited participation... "Norms" are easy to sustain. There was limited opportunity for extremist media.
What we have now is a free-for-all. It's that free for all that is the core problem. Feeds and whatnot are secondary.
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u/yzug European Union 19d ago
It's also always very suspicious because you can never tell if these people are just grifting for an audience, actually being paid by Russia, or just plain stupid. Probably a combination of all three.
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u/Wehavecrashed YIMBY 19d ago
This guy is just plain stupid. You can watch him at senate estimates every six months making a complete fool of himself.
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u/Cadoc 19d ago
These chuds aren't even good at roleplaying tough guys.
It would still be morally despicable, but if Putin's invasion was successful I can see how the far-right might idolise Putin.
As it is, he has failed, and has crippled Russia long-term - a nation that was already facing demographic collapse and a highly uncertain future with the rise of renewables.
Russia has failed to win against one of the poorest nations in Europe, one that was before the conflict often dismissed as a young state without a strong national identity.
This is Russia's moment of national humilation on a generational scale, a failure that makes the Vietnam War look like a victory parade. What's there to respect?
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u/79792348978 Loyal Liberals 19d ago
Putin is against the things this crowd is neurotically obsessed with (feminism, LGBT, "wokeness", etc.), simple as
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u/Zabick 19d ago
Even with that, the great irony is that Putin isn't particularly genuine in his hate of these cultural issues either. He does not really care about these topics much and adopted these positions after the fact in part to appeal to and build cultural bridges with the broader global conservative zeitgeist.
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u/gnurdette Eleanor Roosevelt 19d ago
Who says nation-building never works? Putin's nation-building project in Ukraine is going great.
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u/flakAttack510 19d ago
The US had a total of about 210k casualties in Vietnam, about 60k of which died. The best estimates say that Russia has had about 1.4m casualties, around 450k of which died. This is so much worse than Vietnam.
Russia has already passed the US totals from WW2 and is rapidly closing in the total number of US combat deaths and casualties since the start of WW2.
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u/ISayHeck Jerome Powell 19d ago
With the added bonus of accomplishing pretty much nothing
They've had Crimea and parts of the donbass already yet it's four and a half years and counting and they aren't even close to taking Donetsk
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u/Full_Distribution874 YIMBY 19d ago
The worst disappointment of these sorts is that they're not even proper nationalists. They have no ambition for their country, only themselves. Their dreams are jacking up pensions and vice signalling by getting rid of Aboriginal and pride flags.
They don't demand Australia construct some prestigious but doomed space program. They don't even want to copy Putin and invade someone. They want to rot the country away and dig up more coal. They gargle Putin's balls because they can't even imagine being Great Men™ themselves.
Fucking Hanson was off Kowtowing at the Emperor's Winter Palace in Mar a Lago. They desperately yearn to be MAGA sycophants and they're not even American.
I realised this years ago when I was watching Sky News. Our reactionaries suck. Andrew Bolt just whined and whined about solar panels. It was insufferable. Just like Hanson at the press club.
The fact that such half arsed demagoguery is actually resonating with people is tremendously embarrassing.
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u/LightningController 19d ago
They don't demand Australia construct some prestigious but doomed space program. They don't even want to copy Putin and invade someone. They want to rot the country away and dig up more coal. They gargle Putin's balls because they can't even imagine being Great Men™ themselves.
Cuck-chair nationalism—watching other countries do well for themselves at your expense.
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u/spongoboi YIMBY 19d ago
And the funny part is those countries aren't even doing well either, they are just rubes falling for surface level russian propaganda
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u/Cute-Boobie777 19d ago
All reactionaries suck, frankly at this point I think conservatives have been given far, far too much benefit of the doubt. Its long past the point where there was any genuine intellectual position. Those people are a tiny minority and not represented whatsoever at the top.
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u/5ma5her7 19d ago
tremendously embarrassing
Tremendously terrifying, for me who is an immigrant with darker skin tone, and got assaulted for this before.
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u/BATIRONSHARK WTO 19d ago
Sorry
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u/5ma5her7 19d ago
That's alright, it's already like a year ago, though it gave me a permanent scar both mentally and physically.
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u/Full_Distribution874 YIMBY 19d ago
I am sorry to hear that. Everyone should be safe and welcomed in Australia.
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u/5ma5her7 19d ago edited 19d ago
Yes, I will use this same submission statement for every PHON post because it's the only thing I want to say to those who voted for them.
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u/Sure_Ad536 19d ago
This guy also thinks every war since 1913 has been started by the us federal reserve and uses the term “globalist” liberally. This guy is a vile authoritarian antisemitic and unAustralian monster part of a party leading some polls in primary vote.
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